‘We enjoy being a ruckus democracy’, says SBI chief

State Bank of India chief Arundhati Bhattacharya today said she enjoys being in a “ruckus democracy” than in China.

Responding to a query at World Economic Forum on whether she sometimes feels that she would rather be a government official in China, she quipped: “Not really. I think we quite enjoy being a ruckus democracy.”

“I think in India the good thing is that if you really focus on a problem we are able to do that project in a very very cost effective manner,” said the chief of India’s largest lender.

Listing out strides made by India, the State Bank of India Chairperson cited the example of the Mars project, where the per kilometre cost of the project was less than a taxi ride across the national capital Delhi.

“If look at the recent financial inclusion project that the government has taken where by they said that every household must have a bank account, which has been accomplished by banks like us in five months at a very very minimal cost,” she said.

“If you put everybody together and they are focussed on a particular objective, I think in India, we can get it done. I think we have actually been quite frugal in our usage of capital, we are one of those countries where we have not had investment-led growth,” she added.